


The World Frozen in Memory

by Unuora



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Depressed Crowley (Good Omens), Evolution, Hurt/Comfort, Isolation, M/M, Post-Apocalypse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-15
Updated: 2020-05-15
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:08:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24190324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Unuora/pseuds/Unuora
Summary: Adam brought the apocalypse, and destroyed the world. Now in the settling silence of an empty battlefield Crowley wonders what he's supposed to do now.No antichrist, no humanity, no head offices... no Aziraphale.It's a barren wasteland, but maybe not forever.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 20
Kudos: 110





	The World Frozen in Memory

**Author's Note:**

> Just as a warning I want to say that like many people I am in quarantine and like, Not Handling it Well. And this fic came to me like a burst of inspiration! and it was only about 75% of my way through it that I realized how FucKING MUCH I was projecting.
> 
> So, yes, there are a lot of themes of isolation and loss of control and uh, depression.
> 
> OBVIOUSLY it has a happy ending because I am incapable of writing anything without, but I think this has the potential to be distressing to people who are, like me, feeling a bit heckin lonely out here.
> 
> Though I hope to someone this can provide a modicum of comfort. Enjoy!

And so when an angel and a demon took the hands of the antichrist and said, “we’re beside you,” it was with the hope that a human, full of good and evil alike, would choose the safety of humanity in the long run.

Not everything goes according to plan.

On one side there was a spark of hope burning brightly, persevering, and on the other there’s a wash of hellfire bright enough to drown it out. Crowley doesn’t get to experience anything more than that. The next thing he’s aware of is being hauled to wakefulness by the rancid, sulphuric burn of the air, his mind still full of ash. He lies there, dizzily, and he knows he’s in Hell. He doesn’t even have to open his eyes. He can extrapolate. The world ended. It’s over. This is it, and he’s been thrown back in the pits. The war’s begun.

It takes him a long time to find the strength to open his eyes. Even longer to get up, to shamble his way through Hell to investigate.

Hell’s upper floors are swarmed with demons adorned with what passes as battle gear. Some are wearing armor, pilfered from hundreds of years of human wars, and some just wear sharpened claws and manic bloodlust. Crowley sneaks through the ranks, trying to go unnoticed, feeling the last dregs of hope seep out of him. There will be no second wind. The antichrist—

A ripple of shouts travels through the crowds of demons. It makes its tumultuous way to where Crowley’s lurking like a tidal wave, the noise crashing over him with enough force to make his knees shake. For a long moment all he can hear is the senseless clamoring of demons and the banging of weapons. The hissing and spitting gets louder as the demons egg themselves on. They’re ready for a massacre.

“Oh, fuck,” Crowley whispers to himself. For half a moment, he has no idea how he’s going to get out of this alive.

There’s a cry from far away and Crowley barely has time to duck away before the stampede starts. He ducks into a forgotten storeroom and watches as demons shove and push each other in their eagerness to spill blood. The sight fills him with dread, and he dully watches the steady trickle of demons filing above ground for hours, or maybe mere seconds, and then Crowley’s alone, unnoticed, in the upper echelon of Hell.

He can’t stay down here forever. Not after Beelzebub remembers what he’s done. With the apocalypse underway it might distract them, but Crowley was caught conspiring against their revolution. And with—with his adversary, no less.

Above ground angels and demons are surely fighting to the death. If he goes up there he’ll surely be killed. He’s a snake, after all, no good for fighting. More suited to slithering about, sneaking unnoticed.

He’s only going to get one chance to escape, too. No way he’s going to be allowed another slip up. By the time he manages to creep above ground unnoticed the sky has gone red. It’s a world unrecognizable, and somewhere at the center of it is Adam, just a kid…

No, not a kid anymore. He’s the antichrist. He’s wrought exactly what he was supposed to, and there’s no saving them now. There’s no saving any of them now.

Crowley doesn’t recognize this part of England. Everything is already falling apart, fragmenting at its root. Hellfire blazes through cracks in the earth in a punishing inferno, the seeping wounds of a dying planet ravaged with anger.

He’s sure if he looked skyward he’d see angels falling, the streaks of stardust penetrating the already smoggy atmosphere. But he can’t. He’s already seen it once before, he doesn’t want to see it again.

He can still feel the ghost of Aziraphale’s hand in his, hoping so valiantly for a hopeful future.

He has to hide. He doesn’t know where he’s supposed to go where Hell won’t follow, but he has to go somewhere. He feels his heart racing in his chest, his pulse beating quick against his skin. The world is burning around him, stood frozen at the grand apocalypse unfolding, and he can only think one thing:

_Oh, Aziraphale._

It’s some number of years before he notices it. Crowley doesn’t know if he’s the last demon settled on Earth, but after he uncurls himself from his hiding place he begins to notice he’s not the last living thing on Earth.

He should be. That was the whole point of the apocalypse. Ending all life on Earth, blah, blah, the works. But he blinks, rubs his gritty eyes, and the greenish smudge in his vision doesn’t disappear. Beneath the cracked and scorched earth life still grows, despite everything. He shakes himself off from where the dirt had settled on him, pulling creaking limbs into motion again.

It’s impossible. The apocalypse failed.

It’s only once he’s sat in front of the little spark of life that he wonders if this was meant to happen. He tries hard not to think about what a certain someone would say about that sentiment. The sun is burning hot against his back, the open, cloudless sky all that more endless. Its oppressive gaze is stifling. Underneath the black fabric of his clothes Crowley starts to sweat.

He runs a delicate fingertip along the leaf of the plant, feeling awe in spite of himself. To fight so hard, against all odds, only to push through the cracks of an old ruined world…

For the first time since the end of the world Crowley wonders what else could be out there.

He searches, and what he finds is the last thing he’d expect. He finds plants, growing where none should grow, dotted with buzzing insects. He watches through the decades as they flourish, forging through the destruction left behind, and in centuries they’re healing the scars of the land.

He’s been given his very own Eden. Whether it’s a blessing or a curse, he’s not sure. Yet time and time again Crowley thinks of bright, blue eyes and the way he would surely love—

There’s no point in wishing.

Besides, this is a miracle enough. The first time Crowley sees an animal in his little Eden he nearly doesn’t believe it. It’s nothing like he’d ever seen before, not in all his years on Earth, but it walks and eats, and does not like to be approached.

The snarling quadruped is nothing like any of the humans, of course. But it means the angels were wrong. The demons, too. There was no great reckoning to irrevocably ravage the Earth. It grows without them, despite them, in spite of them.

They never needed any plan.

It makes him want to howl with laughter. It makes him sick to his stomach. Crowley watches the creature for a long time, limbs numb with something like shock and something like grief. Even with all the growth there are still great cracks in the land that bare marks of Hellfire. He looks too hard he can almost see Archangel Gabriel burning to death, the land he so disregarded becoming his satirical funeral pyre. It should make him feel better. It doesn’t.

He closes his eyes when the afterimages of Hellfire become too unbearable. There are times when they follow him in his nightmares, but he is given mercifully quiet sleep.

The next time he awakens his tiny garden has grown into a luscious canopy of green. He’s been practically grown into the soil, and he suspects only out of subconscious miraculous intervention that that didn’t happen. He unearths himself with hesitant carefulness, staring around at the nearly alien world around him. An entirely new landscape has been birthed in the time he was asleep.

It’s not the first time he’s slept for a remarkable amount of time before, and certainly not the first he’s awoken to surroundings unlike those he fell asleep in. Before… Well, before, he had newspapers, and the internet, and other humans to ask what the whole deal with the printing press or whatever new war had begun mucking things up. There’s no one around now. Just him and the wild, empty wilderness. How long he’s been asleep is a mystery to him, but judging by the sour taste in his mouth it was for quite a while.

He could miracle himself some water, but he’d like to look around. With all the foliage about there has to be water somewhere, and it doesn’t take him long to find out where. A little trickle of water streaming through networks of roots leads him to a steadily flowing river.

The water is as clear as he’s ever seen it, fresh and glorious. It’s only after he’s lifted his head from the stream that he realized that he’s not alone. Downstream, unaware, a human is drinking from the stream. They’re too far away to see clearly, but they look so familiar. Two arms, two legs, scruffy hair pulled over their shoulder. Their head lifts, and it’s only Crowley’s fast reflexes that keep him from being seen. He peaks over the twisted branch of a low hanging tree to watch the human stand up and go on their way.

Crowley’s still wearing his modern attire. Well, what used to be modern attire. Everything from his jeans to his shiny watch preserved with perfect quality thanks to the thrum of demonic power still running through his veins.

Even though the human… or what might be a human… has left, Crowley belatedly realizes he can’t go about like this. He stares at his grandiose watch, still dutifully ticking away after an unspeakable amount of time, and wonders in mute alarm what would happen if he accidentally influenced human advancement somehow. Would it be a good thing? Would he kill them?

Is this what She felt like?

This time the laughter bursts out of him unbidden. The sparkle of excitement is blooming fast in his stomach now, so fast he fears he might choke on it. He feels his stomach clench, a nauseating wave of emotion passing over him. He feels unmoored. Like a ship in a storm.

A human. How foolish to think that they ever could keep them down. They’re persistent little buggers, and all those years, angels and demons alike had been mocking them for such a thing.

It was what Crowley had been saying all along. Those bastards had been underestimating them for as long as they were on Her creation. And now—oh, now! Aziraphale would be so—

Oh.

Oh, Aziraphale.

The glowing euphoria dims as suddenly as it arrived, and then he’s just staring at his watch again, wondering what he’s supposed to do at the birth of a new humanity. He can’t stay like this. He’d been wary about actively using miracles lest he draws unwanted attention, but it had been—been a number of years. Surely they thought he was dead by now.

It feels wrong to disappear all his belongings, his last connection to his old life, but it’s not like they’re real. Conjured from the ether instead of delicately pampered they’re as removed from the human world he left behind as he is. Still, he had spent so much time nitpicking every outfit for every era, making it fit just right, feel just right, look just right. Already the life he left back in London is growing fuzzy with the endless passing days, and soon he’ll forget all that. To put it behind is—

Sentimental. Crowley closes his eyes and snaps his fingers. The brief glimpse he got at the other human didn’t give him much to go off of in terms of fashion, so he makes his best guess. Worst comes to worse he can pretend he’s from a faraway land. It’s not far from the truth.

He waits one moment, two, five, ten, and by then he’s fairly sure he’s gone unnoticed. It doesn’t stop the creeping of fear up his spine, and he knows he should start moving.

The clothes he’s miracled up don’t stop him from feeling naked, though. Striped away from everything he’s familiar with he can’t quite help but feel like he’s left some important piece of himself behind. There’s a grief that he can’t quite get a handle on, and despite his best efforts it’s strong enough to drive him to a halt.

He’d like to say he’d had a hard time deciding what to bring back, but he’s snapping his fingers before his brain has even connected all the dots. Then, inside his palm is a little signet ring. It’s just as intricate as he remembers it, g—sat—whoever knows how long he spent staring at it. It may be a bit sacrilegious to show off so much angel iconography on a demon, but there is little that isn’t sacrilegious at the moment.

He ties the little ring around a string he throws around his neck. Tucked beneath his garments no one will ever suspect anything, and Crowley can feel a satisfied thrum at the touch of cold metal against his skin. It’s a memento, he tells himself. Not a memorial.

Whatever it is it guides him, leading him through trees. Like a compass, it feels it pulling him, one step at a time, until he’s stumbling onto a little collection of humans. He just watches for a moment, not quite ready to launch into the introduction process quite yet. He remembers that well enough, bumbling through language barriers and making his way on an abundance of improvisation. For the moment it’s enough to just watch, feeling reminiscent of Eden, the days before any supernatural being really had their foothold in infiltration. In those days it was a lot of just watching, in silent awe despite himself, at the things that She had created.

They’re just as brilliant as he remembers them being, even before all the fancy extras like cars and cell phones. They make art and tell stories and love, fiercely, possessively, protectively, because it’s a world where their lives are perilously short.

Such a precious thing to want to destroy.

This time, maybe this time they’ll be left right alone. None of this horsemen of the apocalypse, none of this finishing a holy war on land that no longer belongs to Heaven or Hell. A race so removed from God that they’ve entirely shaken off Her shackles. What would humanity be like, untouched by supernatural meddling?

As soon as Crowley has that thought the smile on his face slipped off. Even with a new outfit and some nifty improvisational skills he can’t meet those humans. It doesn’t matter if he looks like a perfect imitation it doesn’t chance the fact he’s a demon. He’s a demon with a history of _meddling_ , and it’s more than a miracle that humanity is back, how can he push his luck.

Despite himself he thinks of him and Aziraphale on the wall of Eden. _Wouldn’t it be funny if you did the bad thing and I did the good one?_

No. It’s just him this time. No give and take, no potential for mistake. Humanity is too fragile right now, and he could tempt—he could _say_ something—no.

He’ll watch. It’s easy to keep hidden; he’s a snake, after all. He hunkers down more comfortably on his perch, hugging his knees to his chest to try and abate the hollowness in his chest. The little signet ring is warm against his chest, and he fishes it out. It’s tiny in his fist, and he squeezes tight enough to feel the edges dig into the flesh of his palm. It’s barely anything, but it’s there.

He can wait.

Then, there’s a storm coming. Crowley can feel it in his chest, brewing, angry, a senseless beast. If it comes it will be strong enough to wipe out the little population of humans squatting here, and as far as Crowley’s seen they’re the only ones. These desperately precious creatures have no idea what is coming for them, and in a few hours they’ll all have died. Rivers will flood; cliffs will slough off in muddy torrents. Those who survive the deluge will suffer through poisoned water and little food. It’s murder. It’s history.

A little, lost part of Crowley wonders if this is God staring down at them again. A holy flood, a meticulous list of sins, the meager offering of some sparkly lights in the sky as payment for lives lost.

Crowley screams, suddenly furious. The sudden ferocity of it is surprising, so abrupt he can barely control himself with it. He grabs fists full of his hair and pulls until it aches. The pain sparkles at the back of his eyes, down his neck, leaving a trail of adrenaline in its wake.

(When did it get so long? How long has it been? He doesn’t remember.)

He’s got to—he’s—

(Wouldn’t that be meddling? Isn’t that what he’s supposed to avoid?)

The first raindrop feels like grief. All the anger he felt drains out of him so quickly he feels exhausted. He closes his eyes, face upturned to the sky, feeling the drops of cold skittering across his bare skin. The sharp tang of ozone of the oncoming storm has never tasted bitterer to him, and he watches, distantly, as heavy rain clouds roll in ominously.

It’s God’s fist, striking down at the impudence of humans for their daringness. And yet, they’re down there, unplanned. They’re down there, beyond the end. Plan, no plan, what is the _point_ if despite every move humanity remains uncowed. Over and over and _over_.

But the bloody rain keeps falling.

He thinks of an angel’s wing, so welcomingly offered to him, to protect him from the rain.

There’s no God here, at least not one that’s paying attention. No more tight control to keep humans from doing the exact thing that they’re doing. What they’ve always done. Flourishing without, despite, in spite of, the ones who looked down on them before.

Crowley wonders if that was what She was trying to prevent, back then.

He hesitates, then snaps, and the rain doesn’t cease, but the humans now might take heed. Maybe someone will take caution, lead some lucky ones to higher ground.

Just this once he’ll conjure that gentle tug on the mind of a susceptible soul. A temptation, of sorts. No harm in it.

(He would consider it such a _kind_ thing, wouldn’t he—)

No, it’s a welcoming present to this shitty world. _Congrats_ , Crowley thinks, glowering down at the little shapes staring up at the rain that’s just begun to really come down. _You’re on your own._

It takes a couple miracles but he finds a place to ride this all out. He manages to find somewhere high and dry enough to keep him safe from the oncoming floods, and here he’ll stay for a while. In this instance a while means however long Crowley can stand to sleep. He’s never slept more than a hundred years because—well, there’s no because now. It’s the perfect time to find out his limitations.

He lets himself morph, spine melting into the long flexibility of sinuous muscle and scales. Being a snake isn’t something he loves, but people will mostly leave him alone this way, unlike if he was human. He’d learned that the hard way. If any of them survive they won’t go poking around an immense snake if they know what’s good for them.

The little signet ring rests on the ground, and he wraps around it, coil after coil until the warm metal sits tucked against him. That warmth will fade, soon, and mulishly Crowley hopes when he wakes up next there will be such a thing as indoor heating.

Sleep comes with the slow sinking of cold until all he feels is black.

Time is a weird thing to immortal beings. It wasn’t uncommon for Crowley to lose hours at a time doing silly, menial things, because to someone who existed for as long as time was around it all just felt very _short_.

Every moment was precious, but not the same way humans thought of it. For them it is granted time, given and so easily taken away; for him it is stolen. He’s been down on Earth, looking like an ordinary human, going through every fascinating facet of their world. All knowing every other creature around him is doomed to be unfamiliar, a drop of water in a very large pond.

(Except for—)

Once, in the early 70’s Crowley rented an apartment in London. It was a beautiful thing, a gorgeous space with plenty of natural light and the comforting ambience of city life bustling outside. It wasn’t until months passed, long after he’d settled in and filled it with furniture that he realized he had lived there before.

Not recently, no, but maybe two hundred years ago. The old building hollowed out and renovated, given a new shine, but the skeleton all the same. He felt the flashes of memories he’d nearly forgotten in the bones of it. It had lived and died, with him, without him. And yet, here he was, stood in the same place again. He was bound to cycle back, cyclical, endless, as the world changed around him.

Still, there’s the bittersweet reminders of the life spent here, written in the ghost of himself walking the streets he loves, the city he adores. They’re not something he would consider regrets.

The hardest thing about waking up is realizing that is all gone now. Not even a hint. The world rendered to an entirely new slate, wiped clean, and every time he awakens he sees it as an entirely unrecognizable creation. There are no memories hidden in crevices. It’s a hard reset. Game over.

Crowley sleeps until he can’t anymore, falling in and out of snatches of restless, panicked dreams. Time and time again he rolls over moodily until he resigns himself to wakefulness. He rolls onto his back, eyes still closed against the warm rays of sun peeking into where he’s tucked away. At some point he’d slipped out of his shape as a snake, and he wiggles his fingers and toes, feeling the chill in them sluggishly abate.

He tries to enjoy the fading feeling of haziness before the restlessness becomes too much to bear, and then he pulls himself to his feet. He grabs the signet ring, dutifully miracling it back to its glorious shine, and tying it back around his neck where it belongs. Then, it’s all he can do but venture out.

It’s immediately clear the humans didn’t die in the floods. However long enough he’d been asleep was plenty long enough for things to change.

There are buildings! Buildings with neat chimneys poking out, leaking lazy trails of smoke. Around them are long acres of land stretching beyond where he can see of growing food and the winding trails of pathways that snake into the distance.

“Oh, thank fuck,” Crowley says, or tries to. He’s surprised to find his voice scratchy to the point of uselessness.

There is a very clear reason why he never slept as long as he did. He can’t seem to think straight, his head fuzzy and his thoughts distant. He feels sore and worn in an unrecognizable way, like he’s rotting from the inside out. He stretches, feeling his spine pop and he lets his wings relax for the first time in an eternity. The flex of it feels sinfully good, and he breathes out a sigh.

He doesn’t remember the last time he flew. Without letting himself think about it too much he sets off, throwing himself airborne. It’s easy to go above cloud cover, high enough to crest above any people’s notice.

The world below him is beautiful. It shows the marks of a civilization fast growing. In Eden it had been unthinkable to imagine the two scared humans as equal to the angels or demons. And yet… They were God’s children too, so recalcitrant they escaped, so brilliant they made an unpredictable future that unlike anything any angels or demons could’ve conceived. It wasn’t long before Crowley realized how pointless his job on Earth really was when humanity could form massive empires.

There are surely libraries full of knowledge that has gone unknown by him, whole societies he’s slept through. This isn’t Eden anymore. He could tempt every person he found and they’d still be human, right?

(Human—just like Adam should’ve been.)

It’s really beautiful down there, though. Forests break into hilly grasslands and into rocky shores. He finds the sea like a breath of fresh air, the salty tang achingly familiar in his lungs.

There’s no one out here, but he can feel the echoes of people who used to be. All the way along the empty hills to the chalky cliff sides he feels the familiar thumbprint of humanity in the Earth. He perches along the white cliffs, facing the sea, trying to remember the lives of the people he’d missed out on.

He’d wanted to live out here, once. In another life, maybe, it would’ve happened. But not this life.

He’ll go peak around some towns soon. Surely they’ll have some decent ale by this point. 

(Maybe even a church. He wonders again, distantly, if She is looking down any longer.)

The wind picks up off the sea, the salty wisp of it invigorating against his skin, and Crowley lets his wings out wide, spreading them as much as possible. It pushes him back and he has to brace himself against it, feeling the inexplicable rush of adrenaline shock straight through his gut. The grin that passes over his face is something relieved and manic all the same, feeling the wind thread through his feathers, the chill along his skin.

Quick, before the feeling fades, he throws himself into the sky again. If he focuses he can feel the tug of the wind pulling at his wings, the strain of his muscles. The sensation centers him, like the heavy gauze on his brain is slowly being pulled apart.

So for now, he’ll fly.

Falling back into human life had been startling easy, the motions of adapting rising to familiarity with remarkable ease. It was like putting on an old fitted suit.

(Just old enough there was something missing.)

He does all the things he used to do for jobs. He pokes around, he listens for secrets, he learns the culture. It used to be fun, at one point, but now he can’t even muster up the irritation when someone scoffs at his outfit. It’s not like he _has_ to do anything, anyway.

He certainly doesn’t have to buy a place to live. There’s not a soul on this planet who would notice or miss his lack of housing. Yet, he watches himself buy the loft from a man with gold fillings and a sharp tongue. He smiles when he leaves, knowing in the old days he might have turned his gold into silver, or fixed them all together, but for now it’s just fun to daydream.

It’s an easy thing to get lost in, nowadays. Even without meaning to he falls into potential lives he’s never lived, watching other people’s lives that seem so free when his hands seem so tied. It’s ironic, really, without Heaven and Hell he’s found himself so lost.

And so, he goes back to his house.

There are a million untold stories he hears with rapturous eyes and ears, whole epics that will go forgotten to anyone besides for him.

(He’s had writers note his repeated appearance, or scholars perk up at a new face. Its harmless, it is, but there are plenty of humans to hear stories from that he never goes back to the ones who ask questions.)

He goes back to his house.

He flies in on wars and watches, a perched sentinel in the action. When he hears of a war on the mainland he flies over the channel just to know the grim news. It is satisfying he’s never seen War once.

(He gives information, once or twice, and where he would’ve enjoyed the ensuring drama it’s far easier to just fly back into the night, invisible.)

He goes back to his house.

In the dark of his loft he can sit in the silence. If he closes his eyes and thinks hard, breath caught high up in his chest, sometimes he can pretend he’s somewhere else.

(The thought is always drifting on the surface of his mind, untouchable.)

He stays in his house.

He watches the stars until one day he realizes they’re the same as they always have been. Blinking up at the sky it’s only then that he realizes that they’re the same stars from London. Missing a few here, some there, given a sharper enhancement with the lack of light pollution, but they’re all the same.

Standing next to the door to his loft he realizes the ache of comfort he felt here wasn’t from a nice place to stay or the fondness of humanity. It was because he had been here before. He had stood in this very spot before the world burned to ash, on land that was once different, on land that was once his.

The horror of it crawls up his spine, wrenching through his stomach. The familiar sight of his loft becomes something unsightly, something cruel enough to tarnish something precious to him.

He can never go back to that house again.

He takes wing and flies until he aches, until he can’t anymore and he crashes to the earth in a heap of limbs. He doesn’t care where he landed, he doesn’t bother to look. He can feel the signet ring thrumming its siren song against his chest, and he’ll sleep right here until he’s sure it’ll take him under for good this time.

Crowley had seen Aziraphale around before. Of course he had. He was never _real_ , but the first couple times he’d nearly bowled over some poor human in his franticness because it felt like he was. Inevitably, the Aziraphale he saw was just another stuffy human, aghast at his behavior, his nose just too flat, eyebrows too narrow, voice always entirely wrong.

Crowley had seen Aziraphale before that, too. It would be a glimpse in the woods that he’d go bounding after only for it to be nothing, passing shadows. He’d seen him in his dreams, waking bewildered to find himself not on the bookshop couch.

To be short, he was not a reputable source for information about Aziraphale. He knew that. His dwindling sanity was something he was trying not to think about. The days where he felt like he could just _nearly_ pin down where Aziraphale was hiding were the days he worried about it the most.

So when Crowley wakes up to see the bleary shape of Aziraphale running towards him he wants to laugh. This human, this hallucination, whatever, is not something he wants to deal with right now. He wants to sleep.

But:

“Crowley!” That voice—that voice is so familiar.

And then there’s a warm touch on his cheek, electric, so warm it makes him gasp despite himself. His eyes fly open from where they’d fluttered closed. He blinks, and Aziraphale’s still there. The shockingly warm touch is still there, and he feels it like it connects to his very soul. Humans don’t call him Crowley, and the touch— he feels—

It’s Aziraphale. His nose pointed just right, eyebrows scrunched in concern, his white curls just like the way Crowley had left them. He blinks, mouth dropping open. He scrambles to sit up only for his arm to scream in protest, and he collapses to the ground again with a grunt.

“Oh—oh dear,” Aziraphale’s voice says, in just the way Crowley remembers it, the exact way.

The warmth is gone from his cheek and its absence draws a sob from him, so quick he’d barely processed past shocked before he’d gone straight into gut wrenching emotion. Whatever Aziraphale’s trying to do, assess him for damage, heal him, Crowley doesn’t care. He throws himself haphazardly into Aziraphale’s lap, ignoring the way his whole right side howls in agony.

He doesn’t care, he doesn’t, as Aziraphale’s forced to grapple for a hold on him and he puts his hands on him. Crowley can feel every touch. The curve of his arm along his shoulder blade, the protective hunch around Crowley’s bent wing.

“Crowley—“ Aziraphale says, his voice a delicately trembling line, “Oh, Crowley, wait, you’re hurt—let me—you’re—“

Delicately, Aziraphale tries to move away, to look at his injuries, maybe. He doesn’t make it far before Crowley’s digging his fingernails in hard enough to hurt.

“No!” Crowley shouts, sounding barely human. He doesn’t mean to, really, but he can’t help himself. He can’t breathe, his breath stuttering in and out of him like a clogged machine. He should let go of Aziraphale. He should talk. Where was Aziraphale? Is this really Aziraphale? Is he dreaming?

He hauls himself closer to Aziraphale, his limbs shaking almost too hard to move. Aziraphale doesn’t protest when Crowley shoves him down, even helping him as he falls more than climbs on top of him. Flaring his wings makes a bolt of pain shoot down his right side, but it sends them into relative darkness. It’s only then, with his face buried against Aziraphale’s neck, and the world hidden away by the spread of his wings that he starts to feel his breath come back.

“Shh,” Aziraphale’s saying, somewhere far away. Crowley can feel the irregular shudder of his chest beneath him, but the patient petting of his hands doesn’t stop. The press of his fingers against Crowley’s ribcage and along the length of his arms is enough to send shivers down his spine. Being held so close cracks some of the calcified part of him he thought too far gone to ever look at again. Not broken apart, but opened, like an eggshell ready to be peeled.

The exhaustion comes nearly before the panic has entirely left. Without his consent his wings tremble lower and lower until they’re nearly in the dirt, revealing their faces to the dying sunlight. Blearily, Crowley relaxes the death grip he has on Aziraphale’s shirt, trying to breathe evenly and feeling the uncomfortable tremble of it in his lungs. He curls away weakly to cough against his elbow, trying not to cough on Aziraphale, and oh, he’s disgusting, isn’t he.

“Sorry,” Crowley manages, his voice mangled. His throat hurts with a rough ache that makes him hate himself even more. He tries to shove himself up, to put that distance that Aziraphale tried to make before, but Aziraphale stops with a hand on his bicep.

“Are you alright?” Aziraphale sounds so earnest Crowley tries to look at him but his eyes skitter away, feeling fractured and vulnerable. Crowley manages to look somewhere past his ear.

“Yes, I—“ his voice catches, and he takes a deep breath that has never felt more unsatisfying. He feels hollowed out. “I thought you were gone. Where were you?”

“Looking for you,” Aziraphale says, and gently those hands cup Crowley’s face again. The touch makes Crowley’s eyes jump to Aziraphale’s, gasping. Aziraphale’s blue eyes are soft and wet, looking up at him so lovingly. His eyes are red. He was crying for him?

“Oh,” Crowley manages.

“I was so worried,” Aziraphale says and his voice breaks. He still hasn’t moved his hands from where they’re burning against Crowley’s skin. It’s making him tremble, feeling so reverent it could destroy him. “So worried about you, and this is how you’re treating yourself?”

“Sssorry,” Crowley croaks. He hasn’t lost control of his hissing in—in—however long it’s been since the end of the world. An eternity.

“I’ve missed you so frightfully much,” Aziraphale says, laughing out a noise that shakes them both. “Can I heal you now, love?”

Crowley looks down at this incredible creature, the one he nearly lost and inexplicably, unreasonably, he is here before at him with open arms. Beneath him he can feel Aziraphale, at the points of his knees, at the flats of his palms, at the possessive curl of his pinion feathers brushing his side. He can feel him, alive and breathing, the ever present thrum of angelic power beating alongside his heart. He’s too holy to look at, too precious to look away. It’s all Crowley can do to nod dumbly.

Aziraphale smiles, snapping his fingers, and Crowley feels his skin knit together, abrasions disappearing to leave sparkles of warmth in its place. Another snap and his arm shifts back together, twisting bone and muscle into the right shape. Another, and his shoulder aligns when his collarbone clicks back into place. One last one, and Crowley sighs as he feels his wing align, feathers settling properly again. The shock of the miracle leaves dancing lights behind his eyelids, and he feels dizzyingly blissful in Aziraphale’s arms.

“Better?” Aziraphale asks softly, and Crowley laughs breathlessly, leaning down against him to kiss him. The mindless euphoria of it fills him to the brim, like an overfull cup, until he’s spilling over.

“Better,” Crowley says.

He really should probably get up. He has no idea how long he’s been tucked in Aziraphale’s arms, but his feet are getting cold now that the sun has nearly entirely set and Aziraphale surely can’t be comfortable like this. Still, his thoughts are slow and muddled, and he can’t think of a single reason to move.

Once Crowley can grapple coherent thinking from his mind he abruptly realizes a reason, pulling the little string from around his neck.

“Gosh, oh, wait,” he says, fumbling, nearly dropping the ring on the ground before he offers it up to a stunned Aziraphale. “Here.”

“Oh,” Aziraphale says.

“I—I didn’t realize that you were—well, I figured I should give it back, so, um.” Crowley stops, grimacing.

“I was wondering where that went to,” Aziraphale says, lightly. Crowley bites down on a laugh.

“Had to—um—had to borrow it. Thanks for the help,” he says, and tries to give it back to Aziraphale. Aziraphale doesn’t accept it in an open palm, though; instead he offers a hand, fingers spread, palm down. Crowley stares at it like it’s a wild animal.

“You know,” Aziraphale says conversationally, but his voice trembles ever so slightly. “If you give that back I’ll have to keep a close eye on you to make sure you don’t steal anything else of mine.”

Crowley laughs, slipping the ring on Aziraphale’s pinky finger. “I won’t go out of your sight for a heartbeat, angel.”

Aziraphale examines the little ring. His hand is trembling. He stares at it for a moment, and then he hauls Crowley’s face up to his for a kiss.

They don’t get up for a while.

Aziraphale draws him back to civilization one step at a time until they’ve made their way to Aziraphale’s flat. It’s just as cozy and warm as he remembers the bookshop, and with twice as many books. Aziraphale just laughs when he points it out.

“Oh, well, you know how it is,” Aziraphale says, “Needed a pastime and, ah, humans are ever so creative.”

It’s hard for him to express how grateful he is for the mountains of books, even without the familiar clamor of London. Walking among the piles of painstakingly hand written novels and documents is the first time he’s felt at home since he woke up at the end of the world.

“Have you really been here this whole time?” Crowley asks, catching himself reverently touching one of the leather bound covers, so delicately made. “Same as me?

“Since the end? Ah, yes,” Aziraphale says, looking away. “Got popped back up to Heaven for a tick, and they wanted me to fight, but, er, I said that was not right on, and found my way back here.”

Crowley silently takes in some of those clear redactions. “Right.”

“Ah,” Aziraphale clearly notices something in Crowley’s face. “How did you get out of Hell after the, you know—“ he makes a vague downward gesture that Crowley assumes is supposed to represent discorperation.

“Snuck out. Doors were open, angel. All of Hell free to as many corporations as needed for maximum ire,” Crowley says, then raises a curious eyebrow. “Where did you get yours?”

Aziraphale fidgets, looking away. Then he murmurs, “Stole it.”

A grin passes Crowley’s face. “What?”

“Oh, please, Crowley. I stole it! No one was watching with the Archangels busy, and well—“ he mimes a finger snap.

Crowley laughs, feeling more alive than he has in millennia. “And then you waited around on earth?”

“No, I looked for you,” Aziraphale says, and Crowley softens, chastened.

“I know. I thought you were—“ Crowley starts, then stops. “I’m so sorry. It was painful to hope.”

“Oh, no,” Aziraphale says, taking his hand. “Don’t apologize. You’re the only thing that kept me going. And to think you were so brave even when you were alone—“

“—Aziraphale—“

“—We have a lot of time to make up for.”

“Yeah,” Crowley says, laughing, as Aziraphale pulls him close. “We do.”

It’s warm inside, and Crowley can feel it down to his bones. He feels the crackle of the fireplace behind him, he feels every page written in every book in Aziraphale’s library, he feels Aziraphale’s hands on his, and now it’s enough.

It’s enough for him to withstand the sands of time if he has Aziraphale to keep him grounded. When they go back to where London once stood it’s not nearly as painful with Aziraphale there. There’s still a grief about him knowing there will never be a Ritz to take his angel to. No St. James Park he once promised a picnic in. But there are other places, other things, other promises to make. This time, there’s no one looking down on them.

Now, Crowley can make new memories, living this new life, unafraid.

Besides, the stars? The stars remember.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed! Thanks so much for reading.
> 
> I'm on tumblr at unuora.tumblr.com!
> 
> EDIT: please check out this comic that my wonderful friend Ziote did for this fic  
> [here!](https://byeke.tumblr.com/post/638492458738647040/based-on-the-good-omens-fic-the-world-frozen-in)


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